Educated at Oxford Polytechnic, Strathclyde University and South Bank University. His passion as an architect is the repair and conservation of historic buildings, which has now broadened to involve him in sustainable developments incorporating traditional materials and techniques within contemporary design.

Paul worked for architectural practices in the Lake District, London and the south east before offering his skills first to The Batemans Trust, a British-based charity in India, living in India for a year. He then worked for The Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings as their Northern Officer, whilst building up his own practice.

He won the first SPAB Philip Webb Award for contemporary design within an historic environment in 1993 and was awarded one of four SPAB Lethaby Scholarships the following year.

Outside of architecture Paul is keen on using the Lakes to their full. He gets involved with climbing on the fells and sailing on Windermere in his dinghy with his two young boys, road cycling over the lakeland passes in the summer and ski mountaineering when the snow hits the hills. He is also a member of Kendal Mountain Rescue.